Tell Him
by clair beaubien
Summary: What would've happened if Dean had tried Doctor Benton's "Immortality Potion"? Sam has a nightmare that shows him.


"_Tell him._"

The harsh voice chased Sam awake. He sat up with a gasp and looked around to get his bearings. Motel room. Early morning. There was no voice here, nothing threatening. The pale light through the fiberglass curtains hurt his eyes and he turned away from them. In the other bed, face down in the pillows and tangled blankets, Dean was looking at him. Waiting for him to explain himself. Sam only laid back down and turned over. He couldn't explain what he didn't understand.

*S*P*N*

_"Tell him."_

Sam came awake again abruptly, that same voice, the harsh, angry tone, shattering his sleep. Despite the warmth of the room, he felt a chill go through him and goose bumps covered his arms. Part of the dream dragged out of sleep with him, something about Dr. Benton, something about hell hounds.

Something about –

"_Dean?_"

"Yeah?"

Sam looked around until he found Dean looking through the cheesy curtains at the front windows.

"Wh – uh – I – what time is it?"

"A little after nine."

He sounded funny. Like he was suspicious. Or angry.

"Oh. We're leaving this morning aren't we? Why didn't you wake me up?" But he didn't give Dean a chance to answer, he got out of bed and went to the bathroom, and scraps of the dream and the fear went with him.

*S*P*N*

_"Tell him."_

Sam felt himself sink down in the seat, trying to get away from the voice, that voice and that anger and that feeling of _wrong. _Why were they bothering him? Why were they being so insistent that he _tell him_? Why did he have to tell anybody anything? Why was he supposed to tell Dean about Doctor Benton and immortality and the hellhounds? What difference could it possibly make now? Dean had died and gone to hell and now he was back and what the – what the – _dammit_ what the _hell_ difference did it make now what would or wouldn't have happened if they'd used that formula for immortality?

He pulled himself up in the seat and scrubbed his hand over his face and tried not to look like he'd just woke up from a nightmare. But Dean was giving him looks as they drove along the interstate, those 'we both know something's wrong and the fact that you're not telling me means it's bad' looks.

_Good job looking like nothing's wrong_, Sam thought.

"You all right?" Dean asked.

"Yeah." Sam told him, with all the '_Yeah sure you bet of course I am why wouldn't I be?' _innocence he could muster.

"Uh hunh." Dean turned back to driving. After awhile he muttered, "I thought _I_ was the one supposed to be getting the nightmares now."

Sam didn't say anything because if anybody was gonna get nightmares after what they'd been through, it was Dean. But it irked him too. He didn't say anything but it irked him that Dean sounded like Sam had no reason to get nightmares anymore. Of course not - he'd only seen his brother and last surviving family slashed to death right in front him while he'd been helpless to do anything to save him. He'd had to bundle up Dean's body so his guts wouldn't spill out on the floor when they took him out of the house. He'd washed and stitched and dressed his dead body, watching steam rise out of the wounds in the chilly night. He'd buried – _buried_ – his brother, then spent every minute of every day for four months feeling that empty space beside him and the naked vulnerability it represented like a barbed hook raking him up and down.

No, nothing to cause any nightmares there, was there?

_**"Tell him."**_The voice shouted at him and made him jump. He wasn't asleep, why was he hearing the voice? That scared him worse than hearing it in his nightmares.

"Dude seriously – _what_?" Dean asked, but his voice was concerned now.

"Uh – I - uh – I heard a voice." Sam looked around like he might see where the voice came from. He could argue with himself about nightmares later, he wanted Dean in on this one right now.

"_A voice_? Whose voice? What kind of voice? What did it say?" Dean rattled off his questions, looking more at Sam than at the road.

"I didn't recognize it. A male voice."

"Male? What'd he say?"

Sam hesitated. If he told Dean what the voice said then he'd have to tell him what the voice was talking about.

"Sam?"

"He said – the voice said – '_tell him'_."

"'Tell him'? Tell me what?"

"What makes you think the voice was talking about you?" Technically the voice hadn't specified anyone; Sam just figured it meant Dean.

"Who else then?" Dean asked. "_Bobby_?"

"No, probably not."

"Well then, we're kinda out of 'him's, aren't we?"

"Yeah. Yeah, I guess."

"Sooooo?" Dean pushed when Sam didn't say anything else. "Tell me what?"

"I've been having nightmares. At least I think they've been nightmares. They were only happening when I was asleep but this one just happened now when I was awake. Which could still be a nightmare . I guess. Only -."

"Sammy – for crying out loud. _WHAT?"_

"I think I'm supposed to tell you – the nightmare was about Doctor Benton."

"Yeah? Doc Benton and his magic potion? What about him?"

"Just – I've been thinking – I couldn't help thinking – if we'd just tried his formula…"

Dean took a deep breath and Sam waited for him to snark out again that no way in h – well, no way would he ever do that, ever become what Dr. Benton had become. He was surprised then when Dean admitted softly,

"Can't say that thought hasn't crossed my mind once or twice these past months."

"It wouldn't have worked." Sam said abruptly. "That's what my nightmare was about. It wouldn't have worked."

"What have you been eating Sam? Having nightmares about 'what ifs'?"

Sam didn't answer; it wasn't like he chose his nightmares.

"All right." Dean said. He sounded calmer, actually interested in knowing what was going on. "So – why wouldn't it have worked?"

"Because -." Sam swallowed back the bad taste of what he'd come to realize in the darkness of his nightmares. "Because the hellhound wouldn't have cared that you didn't die. It woulda just kept rip -." He stumbled over the word, over the horror Dean had lived through and died from. " – ripping you apart. You wouldn't have died and it would've kept clawing you. It'd still be clawing you now. It wouldn't have mattered if you didn't die, it wouldn't have given up."

There was no answer from Dean.

"So – uh – anyway. That was my dream. My nightmare. That's what I was supposed to tell you. I guess."

"Hunh." Was all the answer he got from Dean.

"So…?"

"So – what?"

"So –." Sam wanted to ask, '_is that why I had to tell you? Because you'd been thinking about it? Thinking maybe we should've tried it?_ But he didn't want to talk about it, didn't want to bring up even by inference what Dean had suffered in hell because he was getting pretty tired of trying to help only to get blown off.

"So – it wouldn't have worked."

"Yeah – guess not."

They drove on awhile, neither saying anything.

"Sam – you know – if you get nightmares –."

"Yeah?"

"Just – even if they're freaky, don't-make-any-sense kind of nightmares –."

"Yeah?"

"Just – I want you to tell me."

_What – you mean like you tell me about yours? Because you can help me with mine but I shouldn't even think about coming near yours because I won't understand? Because I wouldn't be able to help you because I don't know how? Why exactly am I supposed to tell you Dean?_

"Yeah." Sam said. "Okay."

The End


End file.
